Hurricane Irene barrels up East Coast

MOREHEAD CITY, N.C. -- The misery known as Hurricane Irene propelled its crashing waves, muscular wind and slashing rain into one of the continent's most densely populated regions Saturday night, targeting the Northeast after slicing through much of eastern North Carolina.

Lined up like bowling pins as a weakening but still-dangerous Irene rolled offshore along the coast and extended out over the I-95 corridor were Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Philadelphia, the entire state of New Jersey, the New York City metropolitan area, Hartford, Boston and points as far north as Canada.

"We've been in a 60 mph wind all day and torrential rain that started at 6 this morning," said John Decker, a 42-year-old nurse from International Falls, who is in North Carolina volunteering with the American Red Cross. He spoke with the News Tribune on Saturday evening from a staff shelter at a Holiday Inn in Wilson, about 50 miles east of Raleigh.

"It's unlike anything I've ever seen. This is my first hurricane. It's like putting your head outside the car during a storm. It's not a breeze. It's not a gust. It's just constant."

With most of its transportation machinery shut down, the Eastern Seaboard spent the day nervously watching the storm's march across a swath of the nation inhabited by 65 million people. The hurricane had an enormous wingspan -- 500 miles, its outer reaches stretching from the Carolinas to Cape Cod -- and packed wind gusts of 115 mph.

Almost 2 million homes and businesses were without power. While it was too early to assess the full threat, Irene was blamed for five deaths.

The hurricane stirred up 7-foot waves, and forecasters warned of storm-surge danger on the coasts of Virginia and Delaware, along the Jersey Shore and in New York Harbor and Long Island Sound. In the Northeast, drenched by rain this summer, the ground is already saturated, raising the risk of flooding.

Irene made its official landfall just after first light near Cape Lookout, N.C., at the southern end of the Outer Banks, the ribbon of land that bows out into the Atlantic Ocean. Shorefront hotels and houses were lashed with waves. Two piers were destroyed, and at least one hospital was forced to run on generator power.

"Things are banging against the house," Leon Reasor said as he rode out the storm in the town of Buxton, N.C. "I hope it doesn't get worse, but I know it will. I just hate hurricanes."

It was the first hurricane to make landfall in the continental United States since 2008, and came almost six years to the day after Katrina ravaged New Orleans. Experts guessed that no other hurricane in American history had threatened as many people.

At least 2.3 million people were under orders to move to somewhere safer, although it was unclear how many obeyed or, in some cases, how they could.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told 6,500 troops from all branches of the military to get ready to pitch in on relief work, and President Obama visited the Federal Emergency Management Agency's command center in Washington and offered moral support.

"It's going to be a long 72 hours," he said, "and obviously a lot of families are going to be affected."

By afternoon, the storm had weakened to sustained winds of 80 mph, down from 100 mph on Friday. That made it a Category 1, the least threatening on a 1-to-5 scale, and barely stronger than a tropical storm. Its center was positioned almost exactly where North Carolina meets Virginia at the Atlantic, and it was moving more slowly, at 13 mph, and back out toward the ocean.

The deaths included two children, an 11-year-old boy in Virginia killed when a tree crashed through his roof and a North Carolina child who died in a crash at an intersection where traffic lights were out.

In addition, a North Carolina man was killed by a flying tree limb, a passenger died when a tree fell on in a car in Virginia and a surfer in Florida was killed in heavy waves.

Among the gravest dangers: Extensive flooding along the coast and in many areas inland, as the storm's surge -- a wall of water that heralds the arrival of the core -- combines with Irene's prodigious rain, up to 20 inches of it in the latest update from the National Hurricane Center, to reverse the flow of rivers and swamp vast areas already saturated by heavy summer downpours.

Authorities also worried about the combination of high winds and tall buildings in New York City, Philadelphia, Atlantic City and other cities in the region. Hurricane winds can be one or more categories higher near the top of tall buildings than they are on the ground.

Cascading power outages left at least 800,000 customers without electricity.

Downtown Washington, N.C., was flooded with 18 inches to 2 feet of water. Some of the worst flooding was reported in New Bern, N.C., where the storm pushed water from the Pamlico Sound up the Neuse River and into the city of about 30,000 people. New Bern was under a state of emergency and 60 percent of its residents were without power, according to spokeswoman Colleen Roberts.

Similar coastal flooding was reported in countless locations, and authorities warned that floods also would sweep through many inland areas -- regardless of Irene's rating on the five-category Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale.

"When we talk about the category of hurricanes, that does not explain all of the risk," said Craig Fugate, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. "Even though this may be a Category 1 storm, rainfall amounts are not tied to the category of the storm. Some of the most devastating floods have been tied to tropical storms."

The Red Cross advised its staff in North Carolina to stay put Saturday night.

"I'm with a group here of about 15 to 20 nurses. They don't want us out traveling," said John Decker, the volunteer from International Falls. "We probably won't be out until (this) morning. We did training and were updated on situations in the shelters."

As of Saturday night, the Red Cross had 71 shelters in North Carolina populated by 1,513 people.

"I'm kind of lucky being in North Carolina. They're so resilient because of their history with tornadoes," said Decker, who will be in North Carolina for at least two weeks.

"It's my drive. That's what I do," Decker said. "I just love to help the people in the greatest need at the time. And it's a privilege to come together like this as a team. It's truly serving your country."

Duluth resident and University of North Carolina alumnus Claire Kirch communicated Saturday with family and friends on the East Coast. One of those friends, Mary McHugh, a Virginia, Minn., native residing in Maryland on the Chesapeake Bay, said her home was without power and that downed trees led to the closing of the street into her neighborhood.

Earlier Saturday, McHugh posted on Facebook, "Generator tested, buckets filled, lantern assembled, batteries and flashlights located, bee hives weighted and strapped down, pile of fiction and nyt crosswords at the ready. Let 'er blow."

Although Irene's sustained winds were slowly diminishing, the storm was expected to remain a hurricane or a very strong tropical storm during its voyage through the Mid-Atlantic states and New England.

Forecasters said Irene should continue to weaken slowly as its center reaches the New York area this morning and Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine later today, but they warned residents there and all along the coast about the hazards of complacency.

Many residents of the targeted area -- particularly in New England -- live in wood-framed homes not built to the hurricane-resistant standards of those in many southern states, and many of those homes are surrounded by stands of trees that nature hasn't pruned in decades.

Moreover, sustained wind from hurricanes can reveal and exploit design and construction faults in skyscrapers and other high-rise buildings. No one expected a widespread problem with the stability of the many tall buildings in Washington, Philadelphia, Atlantic City and Manhattan. At the same time, however, glass windows could be vulnerable.

McClatchy Newspapers, the Associated Press and News Tribune multimedia editor Jimmy Bellamy contributed to this report.